Not enough attention is paid to the instructional design decisions that define students' experiences. Lisa Dover Kingsley and Jennifer Perry Cheatham contend that while quality teaching is crucial, the structural decisions supporting meaningful engagement often go unexamined. Using innovations in North Kansas City, Missouri, as a throughline, they…

Although coaching holds great promise for professional development, instructional coaches are often asked to take on responsibilities that are not focused on improving instruction. The authors discuss a quantitative study of four school districts and a qualitative analysis of a single district that, together, reveal how hiring practices and school…

This research examines national data on the status of the minority teacher shortage--the low proportion of minority teachers in comparison to the increasing numbers of students of color in schools. The authors show that efforts over recent decades to recruit more minority teachers, and place them in disadvantaged schools, have been very…

A large-scale, nationwide analysis of Teach For America teacher turnover presents a deeper picture of which TFAers stay, which ones leave the profession and some suggestions about why they leave. The authors learned that nearly two-thirds (60.5%) of TFA teachers continue as public school teachers beyond their two-year commitment; more than half…

Even a moderate number of teachers lacking college minors constitutes a problem for schools. Out-of-field teaching occurs in over half of U.S. secondary schools (rural and urban, affluent and low-income). The source of this problem lies not in teachers' educational attainment, but in lack of fit between teachers' field of training and their…

Learning can easily be fostered in three major agencies: the school, work-related institutions, and society in general. Teachers, who may be found in all three places, would be ministers, merchants, or mechanics--but first they would be teachers. (Author)

A study of the 1980 graduating class of teachers at North Texas State University revealed that academic criteria played no significant role in the job-hunting experiences of those students. The author urges school districts to rely on academic competence rather than standardized tests in hiring new teachers. (Author/WD)

Criticizes Evans Clinchy's lead article in the June 1994 "Kappan" ("Higher Education: The Albatross around the Neck of Our Public Schools") for setting up an adversarial relationship between universities and public schools that is overdrawn, overblown, and distorted. Clinchy is misinformed about universities' practice-teaching…